August 18 - At Sea

On our last sea day, we relaxed, read and ate. At dinner we had our second experience at the Culinary Arts Center. We learned from our first meal that we shouldn't order as much this time. The six of us sat at the same table as before away from the draft coming from the ceiling air ducts. Our meal was very good. ​

August 19 - Amsterdam and Home

I was very stressed this morning. By not planning very well, I made our airline reservations for 11:20. I was worried that we would not have enough time to get to the airport, check in and get through the security line. So we got up at 5:00 and had breakfast delivered to our stateroom at 6:00. We opted to have expedited debarkation at 7:00. This meant that we had to carry all of our luggage with us. (Normally, luggage is picked up outside your stateroom during the night and offloaded onto the pier the next morning so you can pick it up after getting off of the ship). We lined up on second deck with several dozen passengers. The line moved slowly but steadily once the ramp was open. After leaving the ship, we walked for a long way on the pier, went down an escalator to the main level, walked outside and hopped into a taxi which took us to the airport. We got there in plenty of time to check in and go through the very long security line. I finally relaxed when we reached our gate. ​

Our flight, Lufthansa and United, went through Frankfurt where we changed planes. We arrived in San Francisco, picked up our bags and took Uber home. Fripp was there to greet us with a ball in his mouth. It looked like he didn't miss us at all.